Overview

Mine Type	In-Situ
Status	Active
Commodities	Uranium
Mining Method	Solution mining
Mine Life	...
Snapshot	The Honeymoon Uranium Project hosts the historical Honeymoon Uranium Mine, which was Australia's second operating in-situ recovery uranium mine, commencing production in 2011 under previous owner, Uranium One. Operations at Honeymoon were suspended in November 2013 in response to falling uranium prices, with the Project subsequently acquired by Boss Energy in 2015. Successful commissioning at Honeymoon, culminating in Boss producing its first drum of uranium. Ramp-up to steady-state production rate of 2.45Mlb of U3O8 per annum now underway.

Deposit type

• Sandstone hosted

Summary:

Geological Setting
Geologically, the Restart Area domains are situated above the Paleoproterozoic-aged Willyama Supergroup which began forming approximately 1700 million years ago (Ma) and comprises a thick (~7000 – 9000 metres) sequence of deformed volcanics and metasediments. Subsequent periods of regional-scale tectonic activity, rifting and formation of inland seas led to the eventual deposition and faulting of the Bulldog Shale. Around the beginning of the Palaeogene (approx. 65Ma), regional crustal subsidence was once again initiated, reactivating fault structures in the Bulldog Shale and resulting in the creation of the large-scale Lake Eyre Basin (LEB). The LEB extended from Central Australia to central Queensland to central South Australia and involved three distinct phases of sedimentation and changes in climate from a largely tropical, wet environment to the current arid conditions. The first phase of sedimentation is represented by the Eyre Formation, deposited between the Late Eocene to Early Oligocene (~41Ma to ~27Ma), that marked the initiation of active river systems eroding into the exposed saprolitic surface of the Bulldog Shale.

The base of the Eyre Formation is represented by large pebbles and gravels in coarse-grained sand, often containing a clay-rich matrix between larger rock fragments of eroded Bulldog Shale, broken off by large, fast-flowing rivers (e.g. the Yarramba and Billeroo Palaeovalleys that host the Honeymoon Restart Area and Gould’s Dam deposits, respectively). Overall, the Eyre Formation becomes finergrained from the base (Lower Eyre Member) to the top (Upper Eyre Member) which is characterised predominantly by silts and clays, representing a regional change from fluvial (river) to more lacustrine (lake) environments. Within the Honeymoon Uranium Project, the Eyre Formation is situated approximately 70m below present-day ground surface to an average of approximately 130m at the channel / basement contact.

The orebody itself is a tabular, palaeovalley-style, sandstone-hosted deposit associated with:
• Vertical and lateral movement of redox interfaces;
• Channel morphology influenced by localised and regional-scale faults in the underlying basement; and
• Accumulation of lignitic and sulphide-rich material in the shallower embankments and bends of the meandering channel limbs.

Mineralisation characteristics differ slightly throughout the resource area, with the uranium ore situated at varying depths. This led to the decision to separate the deposit into three soft domains: comprising the Honeymoon domain (100 – 120m depth) and Brooks Dam and East Kalkaroo domains (80 – 110m depth). The majority of the mineralisation is hosted in the Eyre Formation, with the tabular lenses distributed between the Lower, Middle and Upper Member subdivisions of the Formation. A small part of the orebody is also hosted within the weathered saprolitic zone at the top of the basement Bulldog Shale. The reduction and subsequent precipitation of the uranium from the oxidised aquifer water was likely assisted by the sulphides inherent within the basement lithologies. The predominant uranium mineral within the orebodies is said to be coffinite (internal ANSTO report, 2016) with minor amounts of uraninite and an unidentified uranium secondary mineral, currently thought to be autunite or torbernite.

Mining Methods

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Comminution

Crushers and Mills

Processing

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Production

Personnel

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